Is consciousness in our head? Does it permeate our bodies? Does it possibly permeate everything? What comes first — the brain or thought?

Such questions have rocked the minds of philosophers and scientists for centuries. While mystics through the ages have reported highly consistent findings within deeper states of awareness, it’s only recently that physicists have started tackling the question of what it actually is.

How did the ancient sages sage? What had they gone through to get there? What were they observing centuries ago that quantum physicists are relatively recently starting to explore as well?

The traditional approach to deeper conscious awareness

The traditional methods of deepening our awareness and connectivity involve years of training, study and practices. Years that easily turn into decades. My own training took many years, and it continues. In my case, a repeatable methodology was used. I know it was repeatable because it was both repeatedly used on me, and repeated on others. Successfully.

In the book The Ending of Time: Where Philosophy and Physics Meet, we meet two esteemed seekers. One is a giant figure from the world of quantum physics and the other a deeply respected philosopher who emerged from the world of Indian mysticism. By the time they met in Ojai, California, both men were already seasoned travelers in their respective fields.

There is a great deal of information available on the lives and work of David Bohm and Jiddhu Krishnamurti. I’ll simply provide the briefest of summaries here. One of the things that is interesting is that they both got off to rocky starts, with controversy plaguing them through much of their lives. We’ll start with Krishnamurti, because at first glance his background seems to be a universe away from attracting someone like a David Bohm, one of the 20th century’s most esteemed quantum physicists. <MORE>

As early as the 1980s, the ability of consciousness to affect matter was being discovered and revealed. At the same time, the old, well established paradigm that the mind was restricted to the brain was beginning to be demolished. Consciousness was not only being viewed as residing throughout the entire body, it was being viewed as extending beyond the body. These were highly disruptive propositions.